


second chances

by Starfire (kalypsobean)



Category: Arrow (TV 2012)
Genre: F/M, Implied Violence, Laurel Being Awesome, Pre-Relationship
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-04-16
Updated: 2015-04-16
Packaged: 2018-03-23 06:19:24
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,958
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3757672
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kalypsobean/pseuds/Starfire
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Ted Grant is struggling as he heals from his injuries. A kid starts hanging out at his gym, Laurel comes back to train with him, and when the two overlap, Ted sees another way to do good.</p>
            </blockquote>





	second chances

**Author's Note:**

  * For [n0rthern_l1ghts](https://archiveofourown.org/users/n0rthern_l1ghts/gifts).



There's a kid, starts hanging around the gym soon after Ted gets back. He sticks to the walls, mostly, small enough that the shadows hide him like a curtain. Ted doesn't kick him out, send him on his way home; he doesn't have the heart for it (or the strength, if he's honest, which he isn't until he sits too long and realises that the burning isn't actually warm air from the perpetually broken air conditioning). Likely the kid's barely got a home, anyway; if it's still standing, it's obviously not the place he wants to be.

So Ted lets him stay, lets him watch and occasionally touch a stray pair of gloves like they're something special, to be respected. He could do with paying clients, though, to pay the medical bills that pile up despite the emergency government grant and the weekly payments. Chances are they'll be friends, soon, anyway; roommates, at least, if his landlord decides on collecting the rent. The kid never talks, though, despite Ted not being able to scare him off with a demonstration of how he used to be, before he was stuck with resistance exercises and stretches for a workout. The kid never comes close, never asks for a thing.

The kid's always gone come closing.

 

It's different when Laurel comes back, appearing out of nowhere weeks after Ted had given up hope of seeing her again. He can see she's kept up training, somewhere; her arms are toned so he can see the lines of her muscles just when she's strapping on her gloves and mask. Her technique, too, is improved; different from anything he's seen, of a pedigree he can't place a name to, but fluid and somehow suited to her so that her personality shows through. He doubts, if he saw her in black, he would not know her, or that anyone who knew her, even just a little, would not recognise her. He doesn't question her on it, though; the rage in her is tempered now, and he senses that she's worked out whatever it was that drove her before, left it behind for something that lets her leash it, gives her strength without clouding her mind.

He raises a hand and she waves back, jumps the ropes and gives him a hug; he swallows the pain and returns it, just for a second.

 

The kid sees something else in her; he's gone for days after she shows up, and when he comes back it's with bruises and blood that leaks slowly from a cut under his eye. He ducks out the side when Ted approaches, but the first aid kit is down a bandage and vial of saline wash the next time he checks. After that, he's back; not as often, but enough that Ted can figure what's happening pretty quick when the office phone rings as he's cooling down from his medically unsanctioned workout.

"That lady lawyer, she there?" the kid says. He sounds scared, and the noise that fills the silence is beeping and voices and scraping metal, which reminds Ted of a bull pen.

"She's not, kid. I can call her, get her to come down, though. Just tell me where you are."

There's a scuffle on the other end of the line, like the phone is taken away. Ted waits for someone else to come on the line while he pulls up Laurel's name on his cell and presses call. By the time Laurel answers, out of breath, there's just a dial tone.

"Can you pick me up?" he says, and Laurel huffs, like she would laugh if she were exhausted.

"Can it wait? I'm a little busy here," she says, and it clicks for him; her, out there in her leather catsuit, and he gets a little light-headed.

"Not really," he says. "Just got a call from the precinct."

"I'm on my way," she says. "You can fill me in when I get there."

 

The advantage of Laurel being, well, Laurel, is that Ted can use the fewest words possible and she can get the whole picture in her head, just like that. 

"He hangs out there, a lot?" she says, and Ted nods, leaning back in the passenger seat like it's the only thing keeping him from collapsing. "Think he's avoiding the gangs?" 

"Maybe," Ted says. "He doesn't talk much."

Laurel seems to get that, too; she was a good kid too, probably, trying to stay out of that scene until it pulled her in and spat her out. She bounced back, though.

 

The Glades precinct is a mess when they get there; the waiting area is filled with people, some of them bleeding. Ted sees the kid's head at a desk, and nudges Laurel, tilts his head. The crowd parts for her, somehow; this is the other side of her, the other way she lets her anger out, and Ted's glad it's not aimed at him (though he would like to know how she changed so quickly; that's why he just had a mask, after all). The kid looks up at her and shrinks in the chair, curling his spine into the gap between the backrest and seat. Ted steps around her and puts his good hand on the kid's shoulder. 

"She'll take care of it," he says, but it doesn't quite seem to register. The kid's eyes are glassy; from habit, Ted checks his eyes, but the pupils aren't dilated more than they should be. Kid's not on drugs, so far as he can tell. 

"Miss, you can't be here," an officer says. 

"Excuse me?" Laurel says, her voice taking on the hint of an edge.

"This is where it gets good," Ted says. He keeps talking to the kid, partly to distract him from Laurel's tirade; he saw the kid's eyes go wider when her voice rose at the duty sergeant. Partly, though, it's to hide the fact that he doesn't know what's going on; this is her territory, where she fights with words and leverage and bargaining, just as his was the streets and his fists. 

She comes back with a cowed man in a plaid shirt and creased khaki pants, who has a pen and a mountain of papers, one of which he pulls out and places on the desk while others fall to the ground. "If you'll just sign here, Mr Grant, sir," he says. He looks over the man's head and Laurel nods, so he signs without reading it. His signature is a bit shaky, but it's good enough.

"So how do you know Jake, Mr Grant?" 

"He works at my gym," Ted says. "Is there anything else?"

The man looks at Jake, and Jake looks back, sullenly, but he doesn't look away. 

"I'll come by in a month, then, and if everything is above board this will all go away."

 

"Creep," Laurel says, under her breath, as they walk out of the precinct with Jake between them. Ted can see where his wrists are raw from handcuffs, and there are new bruises over the old ones. "Probation officers are the worst."

"Probation?" Jake says. "I'm on probation?"

"No." Laurel says it with vehemence. "That man just thinks everyone who ends up in custody deserves nothing more than a jail cell." She drives them back to the gym, taking a rather sudden detour when they hear sirens. The kid doesn't ask any more questions, though, and waits at the door while Laurel helps Ted out of the car and locks it.

"I'm sorry," Jake says, when Ted unlocks the gym and lets them go in ahead of him, so he can walk slowly to the table and chairs in the corner. 

"Nothing a hot shower won't fix," Ted says, although he suspects that he'll have a rough couple of days coming up; he still doesn't know where his limits are, with his body the way it is, but he's crossed them today. He can tell from the way his hands are shaking and the abrupt release of pain in his legs when he sits.

"No, I mean, for calling. And, you know."

"No," Ted says. "You don't have to be."

"Asking for help means you're strong," Laurel says. She's brought coffees from the kitchenette, and Jake's hands wind around the paper cup like it's a comfort toy. "You never have to be sorry for that."

Jake pretends to sip the coffee while Laurel drinks half of her cup in one go. Ted puts his down on the table.

"I meant it, that you could work here. I can't pay you much, but you can clean the floors and put away the mats and bags, and I can give you a few lessons, if you want."

"You mean it?" Jake says. His face doesn't light up, but Ted thinks that maybe if they weren't all so tired, it might.

"Yeah. You've been around enough to know a bit of how things work, and I could use a hand."

"See," Laurel says. "The big strong boxer is asking for help. It's okay. And the probation officer will come check on you here instead of at home, so working here will only make it really hard for him to find anything to complain about."

"What is that about, anyway?" Ted says. 

Laurel passes Jake an envelope, and Jake opens it, reads the paper inside before Laurel says anything.

"Jake you're not being charged with anything. Since they have no evidence, they had to let you go, but since they called the probation officer, he wants to keep an eye on you to justify his job. It sucks, I know, that they just assume every kid in the Glades is a criminal, but you're going to prove them wrong, right?"

"Yeah," Jake says. "Can I go home now?"

"Sure thing," Ted says. "I'll see you back here though, yeah?"

Jake nods, and then he's up, out the door like he wants to put the night behind him. Ted really can't blame him for that.

 

"I'm glad you called," Laurel says, after a bit. "They would have kept him in juvenile overnight, otherwise."

"You know what happened?" Ted says, but Laurel shakes her head.

"I think he'll tell you, when he's ready. You did a good thing, standing up for him."

"I didn't," Ted says, but Laurel leans over, puts a finger on his lips. He imagines it tastes like dirt and blood, since she'd been out. 

"You did. Now he knows someone's looking out for him, and he has a place to go. That's just as important as anything else we do. I did the talking, but having you there, vouching for him, that's what kept an innocent kid out of jail."

"I suppose," he says. For a moment he has a fancy notion, the gym being a place where kids could go if they weren't in a gang, staying off the streets and learning to defend themselves, but he puts it aside; he can't take on too much, not yet.

"One at a time," Laurel says, like she can see what he was thinking, had the same thought. She leans in, kisses him on the cheek, and he turns his head towards her at the same time her cell rings. 

"No rest for the wicked," she says. She pulls it out of her bag, looks at the screen and swipes to send it to voicemail. "I have to get back. Dinner?"

"Yeah," he says.

"Be seeing you," she says, and then she's gone, too. Ted's left to close up the gym, alone, but for the first time in a while, he actually looks forward to coming back after a good night's sleep, what's left of it.

**Author's Note:**

> Jake is the name of Ted and Irina's son in the comics.


End file.
